Film Festival’s ‘Rise’ a Santa Cruz Story that Had to Be Told

“What emerges is a portrait of a band that swings between desperation and exhilaration. There are times (in the Pela years, at least) when they are selling out shows they can’t afford to get themselves to. There are people telling McCarthy that his songs saved their lives, even as he struggles to figure out if Augustines can afford to continue. But looking back, McCarthy believes the intensity of those times also made it possible for him to write songs like “Book of James.”— by Steve Palopoli